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Reply to Needs some advice on how to make lasting intergalactic friends in Strategies Stardock Forums

Trade seems to be the biggest factor in my experience. In my current game I even got the demonic Drengin to ally with me (as a pure good player) through trade routes. One easy way to encourage trade from all the civs is to build a "trade magnet" starbase by adding all 3 of the trade modules. If I do this in the early part of the game (soon after trade tech becomes available), I usually get most of the trade. For more encouragement you can even build more than one trade starbase in a

Reply to Whats the best combo of starting bonuses? in Strategies Stardock Forums

My favorite combination is Federalist (+20% econ), +1 speed (4 pts), +5% PQ (3 pts), and +3 sensors (3 pts). The +3 sensor choice is possibly not the best one, but it makes the game much more fun for me. Scouts have a *huge* sensor range, which makes sweeping large/huge maps (looking for resources) much less tedious. (I usually have finished exploring before I can research sensor tech and buy the sensor-wonder.) If I didn't improve sensors I would get another 10% economy bonus.

Reply to Taxes, morale, and pop growth balancing at start-up in Strategies Stardock Forums

My method is 100% military with all planets over 100M people building colony ships. This works well even at the "crippling" difficulty level on large/huge maps. Planets below 100M build one or two scouts, then start building constructors to claim resources. Earth sends out 200M-300M per colony ship, usually ending up around 600M after expansion. Taxes are usually at 30%, or whatever it takes to keep Earth at 100% morale while colonizing. The "back colonizing" idea is great for resou

Make Money FAST with Aphrodisiacs! in Strategies Stardock Forums

The AIs just *love* the Aphrodisiac trade good... In two games (using the latest April 7 version) against all Intelligent AIs on large maps (12x12), Aphrodisiacs have been a major part of my early-game strategy. I start by putting spending at 100% and putting 100% into military production producing colony ships, scouts, and a couple constructors until my savings go negative. Then I cut spending and put all of it into researching the Universal Translators and Basic Environmental Contro

Reply to How're people doing with tech leasing? Still too powerful? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I agree that it is still too powerful, but I think it can be fixed fairly easily. My suggestion is to limit the total amount of cash the AI is willing to trade. There are two cases of cash trade to consider: 1. $X/month tribute: limit the total monthly tribute to 25% of current production spending (military+social+research). This lets you get more money out of bigger empires, while not crippling any empire's production too much. Smaller empires can pay a smaller amount for a lon

Reply to Vega ScoutWorks, exporters of fine scouts, bankrupter of EMPIRES! (AI need a fix?) in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

The 5-month "exploit" even works at Genius level. (I just tried it.) I got 71bc * 5months = 355 for Comm Theory tech, and 54bc * 5 = 270 for 3 scouts. Strangely enough, the Torians were *making* money (available for tribute) even after I sold them diplomacy and the Diplomatic translator for 478/month for 5 months. (They only had 478 available when I made the deal. Next turn they had 506.) This was less than 2 years after the start of the game. (I bought 3 scouts and put all my r

Reply to Vega ScoutWorks, exporters of fine scouts, bankrupter of EMPIRES! (AI need a fix?) in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I posted a note to the bugs thread about this. Apparently in 1.01a.031 (Monday 3/31/2003) you can get the *same* per-turn amount for 5 turns as you would for 0/1 turns. If you set the number of turns to 6, the bc/turn amount will be much more sane, although you will still make a nice profit.

Reply to Bug Reports in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

[Copied from the Monday update announcement thread.] I seem to have found a new trading bug/exploit in 1.01a.031. When trading tech or ships, I can get the maximum 0-month rate, then get the *same* amount for up to 5 months. Setting the number of months to 6 reduces the acceptable cash to a sane amount. For example, I can trade Communications Theory for 64bc (0 months), 64/1 month, 64/2 months, ... up to 64/5 months. If I set the months to 6, however, I can only get about 20bc/

Reply to Monday Update to 1.01A now available in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I seem to have found a new trading bug/exploit in 1.01a.031. When trading tech or ships, I can get the maximum 0-month rate, then get the *same* amount for up to 5 months. Setting the number of months to 6 reduces the acceptable cash to a sane amount. For example, I can trade Communications Theory for 64bc (0 months), 64/1 month, 64/2 months, ... up to 64/5 months. If I set the months to 6, however, I can only get about 20bc/month. This bug could be even better than the old